russ buettner, fantastic reporting there. appreciate you stopping by. tim o'brien, susan page, thank you to both you have as well. coming up, we are just hours away from a vote to hold the united states attorney general in contempt. the latest reporting on the showdown between the trump administration and congress. >>> and later, electability. we keep hearing that word over and over during the campaign. what does it actually mean? we're going to dive into how it played in past elections and how it could affect the race this time around. "the 11th hour" just getting started on a tuesday night. nigt >>> the special counsel's finding is clear. case closed. case closed. >> democrats on the hill are reacting with outrage to that declaration today from the senate majority leader and with resolve to press ahead with their efforts to further investigate the president. but just a short time ago, the justice department sent a new warning to house democrats about their effort to force the attorney general to hand over the full mueller report. in just a few hours,

i'm joined now by one of the reporters who broke this story: russ buettner of the times. russ, thank you very much for you have painted this really remarkable portrait of thides den donald trump's financial life. help us understand why w he losing so much money during this time? >> well, if you look back the records from that era, he was being things at extraordinarily high prices, and then taking on even more debt to build them out to his design. and the n thevenues that he brought in never supported that debt load. so with ch acquisition, he would go further into the red ink, andhe losses just moued as the years progressed. >> brangham: and what were these ventures for people not that familiar with his history? >> hearriginally ted building apartment buildings. he would make a condominium building that would sell through and keep the ta space. then he branched out into a variety, eclectic collection of things. b bought an offshoot of the n.f.l. ght a football team. he bought an airline. he started openingasinos that were extraordinarily expensive. he bought landmark new

russ buettner. and we have david cay johnston, who himself obtained part of the president's 2005 tax return, an expert in tax law, teaches the same. both of you, welcome to "prime time." gentlemen, thank you. mr. buettner, man of the hour, appreciation. boy, i have to tell you, as a journalist, the scrubbing and cross-referencing you did on arcane data. david cay knows this very well. boy, did you do a hell of a job on this. any kudos you get is well deserved. on reporting alone. forget about the outcome. the reporting is top-notch scrubbing. good for you. what do you want people to take from this? >> i think it kind of forces us to again redefine or reimagine what we think of donald trump, of president trump. and the sort of assertions he's made as to why his ideas matter, the value of what he built and maybe perhaps his integrity in some of these issues as well. you just see that over this period of time he's trying different things, they're not working, he gets bailed out by this brief flirtation

russ buettner, fantastic reporting there. appreciate you stopping by. tim o'brien, susan page, thank you to both of you have as well. coming up, we are just hours away from a vote to hold the united states attorney general in contempt. the latest reporting on the showdown between the trump administration and congress. >>> and later, electability. we keep hearing that word over and over during the campaign. what does it actually mean? we're going to dive into how it played in past elections and how it could affect the race this time around. "the 11th hour" just getting started on a tuesday night. that's harder now because of psoriatic arthritis. but you're still moved by moments like this. don't let psoriatic arthritis take them away. taltz reduces joint pain and stiffness and helps stop the progression of joint damage. for people with moderate to severe psoriasis, 90% saw significant improvement. taltz even gives you a chance at completely clear skin. don't use if you're allergic to taltz. before starting, you should be checked for tuberculosis. taltz m

in terms of the new information they got ahold of, russ buettner and susanne craig obtained basically ten years of federal tax information from trump from '85 -- 1985 to 1994. now, they don't have his full returns. they say they've got printouts from his irs tax transcripts and they've got specific data from his basic federal tax form from his 1040. but from that information, what they're able to piece together is just brutally negative. quote, the numbers show that in 1985, the first year for which they obtain new tax information from the president, 1985, trump reported losses of $46.1 million from his core businesses. he then, quote, continued to lose money every year for the next ten years, totaling $1.17 billion in losses for the decade. quote, in fact, year after year mr. trump appears to have lost more money than nearly any other individual american taxpayer. mazel tov. "the times" figured this out when it compared his results. trump's core business losses in 1990 and 1991, more than a quarter billion dollars each of those years. that was more than double the losses of the taxpa

russ buettner, fantastic reporting there. appreciate you stopping by. tim o'brien, susan page, thank you to both you have as well. coming up, we are just hours away from a vote to hold the united states attorney general in contempt. the latest reporting on the showdown between the trump administration and congress. >>> and later, electability. we keep hearing that word over and over during the campaign. what does it actually mean? we're going to dive into how it played in past elections and how it could affect the race this time around. "the 11th hour" just getting started on a tuesday night. nutrition can seem overwhelmin. even if you try to eat well, you might fall short in key nutrients. get more by adding one a day. it's the #1 multivitamin uniquely designed for men and women. one serving, once a day. one a day. and done. mom, what's for din-ner? just water. lots and lots of water. you wouldn't feed your kids just water, so why starve your plants? feed their hunger and get twice the results. new miracle-gro performance organics. hi, what's this soci

. >> and outfront now russ buettner, investigative reporter for "the new york times" who has done a lot of reporting and seen more of the president's taxes than anyone else in your investigations. you've been through this. what stands out to you. >> what stands out was that it wasn't a great year for the president. his overall revenues just revenues not profits were down about 4%. >> right. >> some of the properties had substantial declines. golf courses overall seem kind of flat. there are a couple of places where he had substantial income coming in that is just sort of disappeared, some of the hotels that have gone away. >> it seems the trump international hoe fell in washington which i highlighted for a reason because it plays -- if you want to be seen and noticed by the administration it's the place you go. that's the hotel that stands out as -- that's the strong performer. >> well it's remarkable, up about 1% staying tough at about $40 million. but that's not a big jump for someone who devoted so much attention to it and for the republican party having sent lobbyists -- or lobbyist

we're joined by russ buettner.e's the investigative reporter for "the new york times" that co-authored this story. you've got president trump's attention. he's already out on twitter. basically he's saying it happened all the time in the '80s and '90s, always wanted to show losses for tax purposes and renegotiate. it was sport he said and he goes on to say it's fake news. your response? >> it's true that real estate developers have tremendous advantages in the tax code in terms of depreciation where you split out the cost of a building over a number of years. but that accounts for a very small portion of what we're talking about. you can't actually get paper losses of $250 million from depreciati depreciation. it doesn't happen. these were massive failures and they were out of proportion with anything else that was being reported to the irs. >> they're also saying these irs transcripts, the lawyers are saying, are notoriously according to them inaccurate and suggesting they will sue you and "the new york times." >>